So while I’ve been working away on my agent’s notes for Book Two, I’ve also been fiddling with some animation for next year’s Raggedy Witches music video (I need to hand a timed reel over to the musician soon, so he can get on with writing the music)

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I’m taking the next two weeks off in order to finish book two of Wild Magic. I’ll literally be sending the Internet out the door so won’t be accessible at all via mobile phone, twitter, Facebook or email.

Be good to each other while I’m gone. Be brave. Be critical. Resist.

See you on the other side,

Celine.

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Been messing around a fair bit today, drawing conceptual artwork in preparation for the Raggedy Witches: Wild Magic animated video I hope to make next year. Mup and the Raggedy Witches may not stay looking like this but I quite like this image…

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I’ll be at a guest at Octocon again this weekend! In case you don’t know, Octocon is a SFF convention held in Dublin – and one of the very few I feel comfortable attending. It’s small, friendly, and very creative-oriented which means it features a wealth of in-depth, stimulating (and fun) conversations between panels of professional writers and artists every year. I highly recommend it for anyone who is interested in reading/writing or viewing anything SFF oriented.

This year I’ll have a sales table (I don’t usually) As a tribute to my designers I’ll be selling those international editions of Moorehawke, Resonance and Into the Grey which feature my favourite covers and which aren’t usually available in Ireland.

I’ll also be selling Moorehawke, Resonance and Into the Grey related badges 😀 (see photo below)

On the spaces women have been carving out for each other in fandom, the fandoms women create, and how those spaces can get taken away and reclaimed. Who are the women who built these spaces? What makes these spaces worth fighting for when they no longer feel safe? What makes women-led fandom unique?

Ruth F. Long, Maura McHugh, Celine Kiernan, Fionnuala Murphy (M)

Writers vs. Animators

Saturday 17:00 – 18:00, A. Tivoli/Yeats room (Camden Court Hotel)

Creating animation is a complex and sometimes rewarding process. Explore the path of the creative energy that crackles from one side of the drawing board to the other.

We have gone from minor characters to major characters to being worried who represents us. From dying in the first act to being the lead. What works of fiction are moving LGBTQIA representation beyond being “those poor unfortunate souls”?

There is, I’ve come to realise, a certain type of hypocrisy that occurs when eloquent, successful practitioners of reflexive self-defence neglect to consider the consistency of their arguments. It’s a tactic which relies in large part on those arguments not being written down or otherwise recorded: it’s much harder to establish that your interlocutor is contradicting a prior claim if they’ve never made it to your face, or if no handy verbatim record exists, and especially if they deny ever having said it. Your memory must be to blame, or else your comprehension: either way, they’re in the right, and will doubtless continue to be so.

Unless, of course, a transcript is produced.

Lionel Shriver is not an author whose books I’ve ever read for the same reason that I’ve never subjected myself to Jonathan Franzen: the woes of modern day, middle class white people is a genre in which I have…

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Just so you know what has been keeping me so quiet recently. A teeny tiny bit of the new book:

Mup flew upwards through the falling snow, a red-coated dash of colour skimming the stones of the castle walls. She had kicked the window shut before leaping into the air, and she doubted Dr Emberly Snr would guess she’d gone outside. But she knew she needed to get to the roof as quickly as possible, and away from the prying eyes. Up she flew and up, zigging and zagging to avoid the windows, up and up until she was among the turrets and the gutters and grim stone faces of the gargoyles. She paused, floating. The ground was a postage stamp of white below her, the walls dropping sheer like cliffs.

She wasn’t even slightly afraid of the height.

The wind sliced across the peak of the roof, whipping the ears of her rabbit hat, flapping her scarf like a banner. I’m glad I grabbed my coat, she thought, tying the hat-ears below her chin and squinting up at the towers and turrets and roofs which still loomed above her. Why on earth does Crow like it so much up here?

She knew her friend would be on the highest tower, perched on the weather-vane. Dad called this Crow’s thinking place. Crow called it his sulking place. Mup suspected it was a little of both. After years of not being wanted, Crow wasn’t used to living with a family, and Mup knew he needed to be alone sometimes. More than that, Mup suspected Crow needed a place he could call his own. Cold and lonely and uncomfortable as it was, the roof had become Crow’s territory. He would retreat here in the same way that Mup might retreat to her bedroom, for a bit of peace and quiet. Mup had always respected that, and had never tried to intrude on his privacy.

Until today, that is. Today she didn’t hesitate to intrude, and she launched herself upwards, following her own shadow across the steep slopes of the roofs and around the snow-covered turrets until she got to the place where she knew Crow would be.

He was perched on the weather-vane, his back to her, watching the sky. A distant gang of ravens flew in loose formation, heading North. Mup could just about hear their rusty cries as she landed on the narrow ridge tiles.

She crouched for balance, still completely unafraid of the height. Snow dislodged from beneath her booted feet, rolled down the roof, and fell to the yard below. It was extraordinary to be up so high. Witches Borough stretched out on all sides: the frozen river, the miles of sleeping forest, and far off in the foggy distance the hint of snowy fields. By some trick of the architecture, the wind wasn’t so bad up here, and the snow fell quite peacefully all around them, the sky close and grey and soft as feathers.

Mup rose to her feet. At this movement, Crow spun around, startled, and Mup realised he hadn’t noticed her arrival. He covered his fright in a furious bristling of feathers. He hopped from foot to foot. He chattered his beak in outrage.

Mup held up her hand. ‘Crow, I need to talk.’

-0-

OK. Hope you enjoyed that.

Back to work for me now,

C

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So many writers come to class with one question dominant in their mind, 'How do I make a living from this?' It's a fair enough question and one I always try to answer well - but it saddens me that it so often overshadows the more relevant questions of 'why am I writing' and 'what am I saying' and 'how do I keep it honest.'

[NOTE: I get many requests to read and comment on manuscripts, which I have to regretfully decline. However I do occasionally work as a consultant for The Inkwell Group If I am accepting MS's at the time and you ask for me by name, they will pass your work on to me.

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